139 The Right Butler’s Path
***[Igor]***
Wearing a lot of bravado all over his body, Igor walked around the palace today with a plausible appearance.
It is on the way back to the room after meeting the Crown Prince.
A few people whisper and look at him, but he doesn’t care.
The fortune teller with the wrinkled face is the subject of talk everywhere and everyone is looking at it.
It was familiar.
However, contrary to his calm appearance, he is nervous and impatient.
It was maddening with anxiety, so far from serenity.
‘You have to hurry. I don’t have time anymore.’
Life is getting shorter every minute.
The entire skin shrank to such an extent that there were no more wrinkles, and wrinkles were created on top of wrinkles.
Now, you can directly feel the vitality flowing through your skin.
What I had vaguely thought of before has become a reality.
The vitality drains away and it becomes wrinkled, and when there is nothing to escape, it dies.
It wasn’t long.
‘If the crystal has nothing more to take away from me…’
A cool breeze seems to emanate from the crystal you are holding in your arms.
Unknowingly, I shuddered.
I had the urge to throw away this crystal right away, but I can’t, I can’t.
If the crystal falls from your body, you die the moment it falls.
‘This wasn’t what I wanted.’
When I first met Crystal, when I felt the presence of a god across the planet, would the result be different if I had run away without succumbing to temptation?
If I hadn’t fallen in love with the temptation to escape from this world and go to a world full of mysterious magic, a place where gods dwell across the stars, would I have been able to avoid the fate of slowly dying from being deprived of life and wrinkled as if in pain?
Or, if he had avoided at least the ritual to expel the pieces of God from this world, would he still have normal skin and voice?
Looking back now, I can see how stupid I was.
If the place where the god from across the planet is now is so ecstatic, why would that god want to come back here?
Why did he want to send a piece of God to that world?
‘Clearly, God manipulated my consciousness.’
I did something to keep him from thinking properly.
I can see that now.
This is understandable because Igor himself is making others that way.
‘But it’s already too late.’
It was too late to get out.
People didn’t know, but every time he raised his voice, the god’s malice from across the planet was spreading everywhere.
A feeling of ill-will spreads so small that one cannot feel it, and bit by bit, it gnaws at people’s souls without even noticing it.
And at the same time, Igor’s life also dwindled little by little.
As the energy of the god from across the stars passes through the body, life is reduced.
But he himself can’t help it.
His body was already filled with a god from across the planet, and he harbored the malice of a god even as a human.
If you take off that part of the god, there will be very little left.
I don’t know if I’ll die or become something else, but I’m no longer human anyway.
There was only one way out of there.
‘We must hurry up and kill the piece of God. He must die in order for me to live.’
Then the crystal will no longer need his life.
I don’t know what happens, but when the piece of God dies, the crystal is filled and brings the god across the planet.
Then he is released…
“…”
Suddenly, my steps stopped.
But is it really so?
If the fragment of God dies and the crystal is full, will he be able to survive?
Wouldn’t the promise change again?
Doubt creeps up.
Originally, what he had to do would have been to the place where the ancestral rites were held.
It was there that God whispered at first.
However, the promise changed little by little and changed again, pushing him into a more and more dangerous place.
If I had known from the beginning that a country would be ruined because of it, approaching the crown prince of another country, or killing a duke, I would not have started this kind of thing.
Like putting a frog in an iron pot and gradually raising the water temperature, they came here little by little without knowing it.
‘If it’s like that this time too.’
I got goosebumps.
It was dangerous before, but I think it’s even more dangerous this time.
The duke seemed to notice that something was strange from the first time he met him.
When I looked at myself with cold eyes, I thought my heart stopped, wondering if I had discovered my true identity.
Besides, if everything the god from across the planet whispered to you was a lie, then what would happen?
Igor took a deep breath, controlled his emotions, and started walking again.
‘I have no choice but to do it anyway.’
If you come now and step back, the back is a precipice cliff.
He had nowhere to go.
‘ha. I should think about how to kill the duke faster without thinking about it.’
If you want to kill the God Sculpture, where the blessings of the Goddess are gathered together, the normal method will not work.
No matter what happens, the piece of God overcomes it in an instant.
The goddess of blessing is the mother who gave birth to this world and the gods.
In order to harm the being who received that love, an existence that was not affected by the providence of this world was needed.
There are only two such people in this world.
One to Crown Prince Robert, the other.
When he thought that far, an ice-cold aura began to flow from the crystal.
Painful cold ran down his spine, and Igor stopped in a terrifying pain.
It’s a warning.
The correction was warning that it was dangerous.
Igor stopped in embarrassment and hid himself in a nearby pillar.
Do not think when crystals warn.
should be avoided at once.
Fortunately, his room is somewhat outside the palace, even though it is the palace, and there are few people who come and go.
No one was looking at him.
‘But what is it for?’
The Crown Prince listens to him like a docile sheep.
Be conscious of the gaze of the surroundings and reduce violent behavior.
The king, the prime minister, and the chamberlain were relieved to see the crown prince’s change and were friendly to Igor.
He rarely goes out to banquet halls now and sticks next to the crown prince, so the reaction of the other nobles is unknown, but nothing special will happen.
I still keep meeting with noble ladies who want to tell fortunes, but I haven’t heard any strange stories.
‘No… Come to think of it, I haven’t met anyone for the past few days.’
I didn’t realize it because I was paying attention to the crown prince.
Maybe it’s because I’m so weak that I can’t even pay attention to that.
Still, on and on, he sucks life into the crystal.
Yesterday and today are different, and an hour ago and now are different.
Hiding in a pillar, Igor saw an attendant come out of his room.
Due to the distance, the attendant’s face could not be seen in detail.
‘It’s kind of strange.’
It was normal for an attendant to come and go in and out of his room.
The rooms in the palace were cleaned daily by servants, and from time to time servants checked the furnishings and objects in the rooms to see if there were any items to be supplemented, replaced, or repaired.
So there is nothing strange about the attendant coming and going.
But for some reason, the attendant’s gaze and gestures seemed to be secretly looking everywhere, and I felt suspicious.
If there were no warnings, it would be a very small sense of discomfort that could be ignored, but thanks to the correction, the crisis was overcome several times.
Even a small sense of incongruity cannot be ignored.
‘What do we do?’
I don’t know what’s going on, but the cause of the warning from the crystal must be in that room.
‘I think the attendant did something.’
Thinking that far, Igor felt an eerie feeling in his chest.
Attendants are the king’s limbs.
If it’s not just petty theft, if the modification is something that’s a warning.
‘I have to run away right now.’
Igor thought so, but on the other hand, there were mountains of reasons why he couldn’t.
After a long time getting a position as an aide to the Crown Prince, if he abandoned it, all the hard work he had done so far would disappear like a bubble.
In addition, there were gold coins and jewels that had been collected in the room.
No matter how much God does, the living human body needs nutrients, and money is needed to eat, sleep, and live in this world.
Igor, unable to leave his seat even in his nervousness, hid behind a pillar and looked into the room.
‘What do we do. Shall I go to my room and come out with only the money?’
But if there’s an assassin in that room.
Even if you want to go in right now, if you think so, you hesitate.
It was time to hide behind a pillar without being able to do this.
I could see an attendant heading towards the room with some soldiers in the distance.
“!”
Igor immediately turned around.
I don’t know what happened or what’s in the room.
But it was clear that they had fallen into a trap.
Perhaps the king or the chancellor ordered it, or maybe another nobleman bought the attendant.
Anyway, there must be evidence that Igor did something in that room.
Fortunately, it seems to be putting on a show of just discovering the evidence, and it will take an hour or two to get people’s attention and see what’s going on.
There is time to run away.
‘Damn it.’
Gold coins and jewels are precious, but not more precious than life.
Igor walked out of the palace, saying hello to the people he met.
After exiting the building, head to the wagon area.
As I had just boarded the carriage far from the entrance, an attendant was coming out from inside the building.
He is a different person from the attendant who came out of Igor’s room.
I couldn’t see his face, but his physique was different.
But I knew intuitively that he was looking for Igor.
From nob le mt l dot com
Just then, several carriages with nobles and officials entering and exiting the palace departed.
Igor’s chariot moves along with it.
Hiding by the window, Igor secretly watched as the attendant was conversing with the soldier at the entrance.
*
I was nervous, but I was able to get out of the palace safely.
Perhaps he hadn’t noticed yet that Igor had run away.
In fact, if it wasn’t for the modification, I would have been caught without knowing anything.
‘It’s unfortunate, but it’s fortunate.’
When he got off the carriage that departed from the palace, Igor rode out of the royal capital in another carriage with his hood pressed even deeper.
It was fortunate that there was a regular carriage leaving the capital.
There was only one person in the carriage, so normally you would have to wait until it was full.
But as soon as Igor got into the carriage, three men boarded it.
I was lucky.
As the carriage passed through the castle gate and the wall receded, a long breath flowed out at the relief that he had barely survived.
However, in the small pocket he always carries, there are only three or four gold and silver coins.
I’ll be able to get by with this for a while, but I’ll have to make money again anyway.
It’s best to get it from a noble, but it’s going to be hard now in this country.
A sigh came out spontaneously.
“…”
Igor suddenly focused on the crystal he was holding.
Now completely out of the royal capital and away from danger.
It should have been fine, but the chill of the crystal was still going on.
‘I wonder if there is a soldier to pursue.’
A few hours passed in the midst of nervousness, and the carriage arrived at the intermediate destination, a small town.
“We’ll stay here today, and we’ll leave at dawn tomorrow. If you need lodging, come this way. Three large coins will get you a night’s rest!”
The carriage door opened and a boy of thirteen or four cried out.
A man got off from another wagon that arrived similarly, and the boy shouted the same thing again.
If possible, I wanted to stay in a decent accommodation, but I don’t know what will happen in the future.
Igor clicked his tongue once and was forced to follow the boy.
The three men who rode with him also move among the people.
The accommodation we arrived at was like a stable.
Perhaps, in practice, they previously kept stables or livestock.
The whole building smelled like sh*t.
A dozen or so people were already sitting or lying on the floor with dirty blankets.
Igor held the crystal tightly in his bosom and headed to the corner.
Crystal is still cold.
It was a chilling feeling to the bone.
‘Why are you so anxious?’
Thinking so, I put my back against the wall and sit down.
The boy who showed us around the place walked around asking people if anyone needed stew.
Several people ordered stew and were given wooden bowls of watery food.
Igor sat quietly and looked at the door.
He tried not to fall asleep because he was afraid that the soldiers might be coming, but as the night deepened, the cheap lanterns that lit up the building went out, and he too began to doze off before he knew it.
And at one point, Igor opened his eyes with pain in his side, as if it were being burned.
As I groaned, I put my hand on my side, and something felt wet.
It was dark, so I couldn’t see what it was.
At that moment, the other side also became hot.
It didn’t hurt, it felt like it was on fire.
After that, the ship…
There is a small gap in the wall facing the roof of the building.
Moonlight came in between them, shining on Igor, and a black shadow moved quietly.
‘Ah, this is him.’
The man who followed Igor after he got into the carriage.
One of them was unusually skinny and tall.
This black shadow is probably that person.
Come to think of it, when I entered the building, the three of them were sitting near Igor.
this guy!
I tried to scream, but something caught my mouth.
A large palm quietly pressed his face and body, and his body heated up again.
The floor was already full of liquid that had spilled from his side and possibly elsewhere, and Igor realized he was dying.
The sensation associated with the crystal gradually faded, and at one point he fell into complete darkness.
***[Benno, butler]***
[complete]
Benno lit a fire after reading a short letter from a subordinate.
After watching him completely burn to ashes on a silver tray, Benno quietly turned away.
The master’s orders must be obeyed at all times.
As long as there is a possibility that the royal family will notice, Igor is not touched.
But it wouldn’t matter as long as Igor was out of the royal gaze.
Instead of taking orders at face value, the right steward should discover the true meaning behind them.
That’s how I was taught, and I’ve been acting that way all my life.
“…”
A beast that exposes its teeth to the duchy must not be forgiven.
Even more so if you cursed the duchess.
I will never forget the look on Oscar’s face when he first realized that fact.
That pathetic face of fear.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen Oscar look so flustered.
‘I can’t forgive the person who made it that way.’
No, my heart went wild when I thought of Igor.
Benno made a smile on his face as usual and left the room.
‘It’s the master’s snack time now.’
The Duchess needs to get some snacks to bring to Oscar.
There will be a sweet drink for Oscar and a cake for his wife.
When the image of the two smiling and enjoying their snack came to mind, Benno’s steps sped up by themselves.
Before he knew it, his face was not a fake smile, but a real, heartfelt smile.